The thing is if we didn't have strikes then as we all know the employers, be they in the private or public sector would walk all over their employees and working conditions go back to what they once were and a pay rise would be once in a blue moon or when they were feeling generous.

todays binmen dont know what a hard days work is...as already said back in the day it was hard collar...humping the bins on heads or shoulders they would collect them from your back yard etc take them to the cart..phyically empty them and then take them back to where they found them...we were happy to give them a christmas box then because they deserved it

today we more or less do the job for them..we now have to get the wheelies out onto the pavement( unless on assisted collection) they then have to take them no more than 3 feet to the back of the wagon..hook them up and the wagon does the rest..we then have to bring them back down

they can empty 100 bins in an hour...bet it took longer than that years ago

i had 2 collections during the strike...my sister waited 6 weeks

they collected my bin last thursday (strike over) so we put the bins out sunday night ready for our normal monday collection...no sign of them coming yet

after the collection last thursday i had to sanitise the household rubbish bin..even though my rubbish is in black bags it was alive with maggots...

the smell as you walked past the bins up our road was awful

we have women on our regular gang and not wishing to belittle us ladies if they can do it its not very hard is it (would they have been able to do it years ago?? doubt it)...another reason is that for years now there has been a waiting list to get on the bins because the job is a cushy one now

do i have sympathy for them?...not on your nelly and i suspect that anyone seeing rats running around their bins would have no sympathy either

lyn

I'd agree with you there Lyn , you forgot to mention the ashes that were collected years ago more often than not they were hot . Latterday bins were engraved in the rubber lid No Hot Ashes . Good old days Lyn never to be repeated

You can't know that for certain, and it's never wise to assume or generalise. What we have is a group of men in fear of losing their jobs being backed up by their fellow workmen. Yes we all know how good (but not so easy now) and financially rewarding a job it is. The problem here is that the men who are losing their jobs are being lied to by the Council. The biggest lie being that they would all be given jobs in the Council and this is the lie they fed to the media. They failed to tell the media or the men that these were only temporary jobs that would themselves go in no more than 12 months.

As for the £ being worth up to 20% less than before Brexit, I don't think that has got anything to do with this dispute, who wants to be put out work no matter what the value if the pound is?

Phil you are probably nowhere near my age. maybe you have never been.a manager, director or company owner like me, maybe your grandfather and great grandfather never completed 89 years between them as dustmen, maybe your father never came back from the war paralysed from the waist down but paid privately to overcome these difficulties to return to work and spurn social security, if so you are lucky. Maybe your father wasn't a shop steward at the Rover in the 1960's and 70's and saw the idle workers looking for any chance to strike. I was there in that period and was appalled at the idleness of the British worker. 'I held all those management positions and saw the idleness of the British worker. Talk is easy but practical experience puts it to shame. I have lived in Hong Kong for over 22 years, but I still remember the faults and problems of the U K, but I do not hide my head in the sand. Take off the rose tinted glasses

You would be surprised at just how many of the questions you pose that I could answer in the affirmative, but it still wouldn't give me the answer to the question that I posed, how can you know for certain that the reasons you give are anywhere near right. Do you personally know any of those taking industrial action?